


Becoming Whole Again

by Cassplay



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Autistic Dora Skirth, Bisexual Anne Weying, Bisexual Female Character of Color, Canon Divergent, F/F, F/F/F, Girl Gang, Labor Unions, Lesbian Dora Skirth, M/M, Mostly Canon Compliant, Motherhood, Multi, Other, Polyamorous Character, Polyamory, f/f - Freeform, lesbian triad, mlm/wlw solidarity, warnings in notes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-24
Updated: 2018-12-04
Packaged: 2019-08-06 20:20:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 20,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16394426
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cassplay/pseuds/Cassplay
Summary: Ever since the Life Foundation incident Anne Weying has been having nightmares, exhilarating, adrenaline pumping, symbiote craving nightmares. She is frustrated in her day job as a public defender but something changes when she gets called back in to look into the case that ended her career.Dora Skirth may have ‘died’ inside the Life Foundation, but her responsibilities didn’t. She can’t return to raising her kids like this, but that isn’t her only responsibility.Tallah Wright is barely hanging on, her employer blew up, her son just got assaulted and arrested for a crime he didn’t commit, and she still needs to feed the thing hidden in the space between the apartment wall.





	1. The Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

> This was partly inspired by the Fantastic AU fic “Carrion” from Thiswasmydesign, but also because I’ve always like the Symbiotes, I loved Venom (2018) and all but died when She-Venom came on screen. Anyways, the symbiotes who usually have female hosts/women hosting symbiotes need more love.  
> Also, I’m a lesbian and wanted more symbiote stuff with people like me, although Anne isn’t a lesbian she does like women and is Bi for the sake of this fic. She will be starting the story in a relationship with Dan Lewis (Anne’s Dr boyfriend from the film), but they will not stay together for too long. This isn’t meant to bash on Dan in the film, he’s sweet but boring and she could do better.  
> Symbrock because that’s one of the only pure things in this terrible world of ours.  
> WRT Symbiotes and pronouns, they’ll use singular they/them/their pronouns. When the host and the symbiote are acting as one, example: when suited up, the host will also use they pronouns but in a greyer area between singular and plural. Symbiote dialogue will be bolded.  
> Expect a weekly update schedule.
> 
>  
> 
> WARNING!  
> Contains discussion of Child Sexual Abuse, Religion, the Justice system, Racism (specifically towards Black People), Assault of a minor, Interrupted attempted Rape, Cannibalism and probably much more to come.

Anne was having another nightmare. The buildings below her were a blur as she flew past. She wasn’t flying, though, she was running, jumping, weaving, anything to go as fast as she could across the rooftops. The air roared past her covered ears and pressed against her shielded eyes. The wind chill would have decreased the temperature up here by at least 10 degrees, but she didn’t feel cold. With a great burst of energy, she took a running jump onto a skyscraper.

She landed diagonally and ran along its side, her feet never slipping as her head swivelled for a new direction to jump next. Excitement spiked through her as she saw the edge of the building coming up, still unable to locate another surface to run along. She saw a street sign not far off, and she pushed off the building. Her sideways momentum soon faded and she began to fall towards the middle of the street. She fell faster and faster, soon reaching terminal velocity.

She stretched out her arm and shot a tendril towards the overhead sign. A small part of the advertisement was blotted out as the tendril stuck to the board, but she was still falling.  The tendril began to retract, pulling her closer to the sign as she fell. Then the line went taught and it began to curve her descent, her downwards motion transitioned to horizontal as the line carried her just above the street and under the sign. Her path began to curve up as the tendril remained attached to the board, she detached it and allowed gravity to pull her to the street, her fast legs keeping up with her momentum gained from the fall.

She ran as fast as she could, occasionally swinging by on tendrils, or running over the rooftops to avoid the heavier parts of traffic. But she finally stopped on the roof of a church. It was not very old, the priest who ran it was probably older than the church itself. She found the belltower and crawled inside, sticking to the walls like some sort of insect. She was careful to avoid the bell itself. Even though it had an electric clapper it would still be bad if she bumped into it. It would hurt, and it would alert her prey. She extruded a tendril and stuck it to the inside of the stairwell up to the bell tower. Anne used the stuck tendril to lower herself slowly down the stairwell. Her feet touched down silently on the floor, then she mentally unstuck the tendril, and retracted it back into her second skin.

She quietly walked out of the belltower and into the entranceway of the church. It was relatively plain as far as churches went. A table was stacked with songbooks, and plastic pockets were filled with leaflets about charity initiatives and voting recommendations counter to them. She approached the door into the church proper and pressed her hand against the lock. She felt her bonded partner slip partially inside it and press on the pins; Finally finding a combination that worked she slipped through the formerly locked door none the wiser.

“ **Hungry**.” She felt a voice say in her mind.

“Soon.” She replied in her mind.

She walked down the aisle between the pews, looking over to where her destination was. Her heart rate increased. She was so close she could almost smell his stench. He was definitely in his office. Why wouldn’t he come to his office late at night if his lawyer told him to?

She was at the door now, and retracted her second skin. Her hand extended to open the door, but then she thought better of it. She knocked on the door to Father George Cline’s office. She heard shuffling inside the office and soon the door was opened by the man it belonged to. He was in his mid 80s, long past balding, and under investigation for child sexual abuses going back 30 years.

“Come in Anne.” He said and gestured for her to come inside. She shut the door behind her and made her way over to stand in front of his desk. She inwardly flinched as she thought about what must have happened in this very room.

“Sit.” He gestured to the seats in front of his desk, and she did so. Her hand bag had appeared beside her.

“Mr Cline, you may know, as your lawyer I have been consulting with the local clergy.” Her insides twisted as she spoke, she wanted to skip this, but she had to do it properly. She took the folder with the records out of her back and opened it on the priest’s desk.

“Yes.” He said.

“As part of that they provided me with records of your leadership of this congregation, going back to 1986 when you were appointed.” She said in a level voice.

“That’s correct.” He said, as if she had just asked a question.

“However, I did some research of my own.” She said. She barely registered a flicker in his eyes, but it was there.

“And what did you uncover?” He asked.

“I found this.” She withdrew a small polaroid photo in a plastic zip-lock from her bag. It showed Father Cline conducting mass. A large pine tree stood in the background. It was labelled ‘Christmas ‘85’.

“My previous congregation.” He said quickly.

“No, it wasn’t, according to the records your previous church had closed down in ‘83” She said. “And you were without until you came here.”

“The photograph means nothing.” He said, trying to convince her of its irrelevance.

“It does and you know it. Do you recognise the altar server next to you?” She knew he did, he had seen the young man a lot lately, given that he was one of the main accusers.

“The record shows that he left before 1986.” He said, and she could practically smell the panic radiating off him.

“Just before new year’s, in fact.” She agreed. “And here is proof you were already leading mass in that very year at Christmas.”

“What are you doing?” He raised his voice. “You’re supposed to get me off, you’re my lawyer.”

“State appointment lawyer, thank you very much.” She said. “Besides, I couldn’t present these anyway, you are right that I’m only supposed to do things in your best interest in the courtroom.”

“And you better not forget it.” He said.

“ **Can we hurry up and eat now**?”

“Very well.” She said out loud to both others in the room. “We just wanted to confirm this evidence with you before we dealt with you outside of the courtroom.”

“Dealt with? We?” he looked around the room, suddenly afraid that this was some sort of a sting.

“Yes. We.” She said, and brought their other half out. The tar-like substance spread across her skin, coating it with a shiny protective layer. It moved up her neck and she felt it interface deeper with her mind. It covered her head and twisted into strange features: eyes like smears of white pair across the black expanse and a grin of pearly white teeth that would shame a shark.

“What the hell are you?” The priest screamed as he ran to a corner of the office, as far away from them as he could.

“ **We… Are… Venom**.” They said together as they wrapped their strong hands around Fr George Cline’s torso, and bit through his skull.

Righteous anger coursed through them, but they knew she couldn’t stay for long. The symbiote receded into a pair of gloves, and she removed the photograph from the plastic bag, placing it carefully onto the desk.

“ **Anne**.” The symbiote said.

“Yes, Venom?”

“ **We’re going back to Eddie**.” Venom said. Her world greyed, just like it had during that kiss. But this was the kiss, Eddie was right in front of her. This wasn’t an office in a church, this was a forest, they had just saved him. Venom bonded again with her former fiancé. She reacted differently, she knew what it was like to go without the presence of a symbiote in your head now.

“No Venom!” She yelled, reaching out as the symbiote formed the second skin over Eddie’s face.

“ **Anne, stop**.” Venom said, she wasn’t sure which part of Venom it was coming from.

“Venom, please!” She yelled as she watched them run off into the night.

“ **Anne**!”

“Venom!”

“Anne!”

She woke.

 

“Anne?” Dan asked tentatively. “Are you alright?”

She was in their bed in her house. She turned to him, he had his hand gently resting on her shoulder. She was breathing heavily, and the details of the dream began to fade. She clung to it like it was the only thing that mattered, of that feeling of the wind swirling around her far above the ground. The emotion of it began to overwhelm her, how she would never experience that again except in dreams, in fantasies like the one she just had, before it soured. She turned her body over into Dan, she needed closeness right now. She began to cry, shaking against him.

He wrapped his arms around her, warming her where their skin came into contact.

“Shh, Shh, Shh,” He whispered in her ear. “It was only a nightmare.”

She really liked him, on paper he was fantastic, a paediatric surgeon, willing to put his job at risk to help her ex-fiancé who cost her a job at one of the most prestigious Law agencies in the city. He was willing to move in with her instead of have her move in with him or get a new place together to preserve his pride. Her breathing steadied slightly.

“You were shouting about Eddie’s parasite.” He said. Her diaphragm flexed and a bolt of anger shot through her at the term. Dan must have felt it and mistook it for a small sob, when he said. “It’s ok, it’s gone now.”

She felt a hollow in her chest, Venom was gone. She sniffed to clear her nose, but only succeeded in blocking it. Dan reached behind him, unfurling his arm from her back for a moment, and the arm returned holding a tissue, which he handed to Anne. She blew her nose, expelling most of the mucous, and a few more times for good measure. She dabbed her eyes with the corners of the crushed tissue, attempting to soak up some of the meagre tears that had fallen from her eyes. Once her vision was clear enough she looked over to the paper bin in the corner and prepared to throw the waded-up ball.

“If you miss, you’re the one who’s going to have to go get it.” Dan said. He was lying, he would always get up to put the tissue in the bin whenever Anne missed it. Whether it was tears from Rom-coms, from laughing at comedy, or from fluids other than tears. She supposed it must be because of his surgeon training, he had to be clean on the job. Some girlfriends might complain about their boyfriends bringing home behaviours from work, but Anne was fine with this particular habit.

Predictably, she missed, and also predictably, Dan pulled back the covers on their bed and walked over to put the tissue where it belonged.

Anne felt her breath quiver a little, and she couldn’t help think about how much more thoroughly the symbiote had enclosed her than Dan’s hug just a few seconds ago.

She turned to the clock on her bedside table. It said it was about ten past five. She sighed and made a choice.

“I don’t think I want to go back to sleep.” She said, making her own way out of the covers and slipping on a pair of slippers. Dan looked up at her questioningly. “I’m going to go for an early run.”

Anne changed quickly in the bathroom and passed back through their bedroom on the way out. Dan was asleep again. She smiled, she would wake him when she got back. She slipped a spare set of keys into her pocket, put in some headphones and started up her workout playlist. Energizing music played into her ears. She felt herself wake up more as she listened to the beat.

She passed through the lounge room and stopped at the door. She drew a deep breath in, held it for a few seconds, then released it.

She stooped down to the running shoes she kept by the door and pulled them over with her as she sank into the side of the sofa next to the door. The music kept going in her ears as she tied the laces. She thought back to that feeling, the freedom of running along rooftops with the wind in her face, she shivered.

She finished tying her shoes and stood. She opened the door, exited, shut it and began to mentally plan out her route for this morning. She could go left and up the hill, for a run around the summit, or right and down into the heart of the city.

She eventually decided on right. She jogged down the slope, breathing through her nose, and thought idly back to the dream.

She had done her own snooping on the allegation made against Father Cline, and had found the photograph a month ago. She sighed bitterly, annoyed at the situation. She had been researching at the library closest to the parish, looking through history books and old journals when she had found the polaroid. It was exactly as it had been in the dream, utterly damning.

Nonetheless it was a difficult situation, as Cline’s district appointed defender she had to do her best to ‘defend’ him, even as much as that made her stomach churn with disgust. She couldn’t submit the photo herself, as that would be seen as going against the best interests of her client. She couldn’t hand it off to a prosecutor to submit, there would be too much suspicion around how she found it. So, she had done the only thing she could do, put it back in the public access photo gallery and call in an anonymous tip. Whether the cop had never bothered to check it out, or whether they didn’t believe the anonymous tip was a question she didn’t want answered. Overall it was a no-win situation, and if George Cline though she wasn’t doing everything she could he just had to snap his fingers and she would be swapped out for someone else, probably someone with far less morals than her. It would be so much easier if she was still bonded with Venom, they could crawl into the church, just like in her dream, and bite his head off. The world would be far better without him.

She felt a pang as she remembered her work on the Life foundation case. Eddie may have ruined her career with the firm, but he had taught her two things: Keep your work separate from your love life, and if a powerful entity like the Life Foundation (or the Catholic Church, for that matter) was under investigation, it was probably far worse than it seemed.

She slowed her run a little bit to catch her breath. She couldn’t stay mad at Eddie, especially after what happened, with what the Life Foundation turned out to be. She should have listened to him.

Of course, if she had she would probably be fired anyway, and have ended up in exactly the same spot as she was now. Part of the public defender’s circuit, for people who couldn’t afford their own representation. It wasn’t all people like George Cline, something like 95% of people she had represented were good people, but had made some bad choices. Well that wasn’t exactly right either, they hadn’t had much choice, a lot of them. It wasn’t always as comical as stealing a loaf of bread for their starving nephew, but it was often pretty close to it.

She started up running again.

Yesterday she had received another case file. She was still assigned to the Cline case, but after so long without a new lead (even though she had rung in other anonymous tips since then) the prosecutors office seemed to be looking to put it on hold. The new case file was a different monster entirely, a kid had allegedly stolen some stuff from a supermarket that day, and then been set upon by security. He had ended up with several broken ribs, a concussion, internal bleeding, and been charged with theft.

Anne scoffed under her breath, she shouldn’t be handling this sort of case, she didn’t have experience in Child and Family Law, but of course, the SFPD had decided to try him as an adult.

Not for the first time, she wondered if she had chosen the right field to go into.

She set the cases from her mind, this was supposed to be her time and she didn’t want it to be ruined by her getting angry.

She continued jogging for a way just letting her mind go blank before she decided to head back to the house. But as she was rounding the corner, Eddie was there.


	2. Work; Now and Before

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne begins work on her latest case and receives a request from her former employer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't worry, we will answer your questions in time.

Venom. They were there, still inside Eddie. She didn’t think she had let on that she realised, but he had, slipping into a plural we a few times. She sighed as she watched his back, walking away yet again. She was happy for Eddie that Venom had survived, but at the same time she couldn’t help feeling jealous of him. He was managing to pick up his life, putting it back together after what happened on the launchpad, and before that with him being fired.

They had loved each other, she knew that for sure, but now it was gone. She knew the three, or four parties involved if you included Dan, were happy with them being friends; And he had told her that he might be getting his old show back, but apparently, he wasn’t sure he wanted it, something about visiting a prison to write a print story on a serial killer he had said. In her opinion he could do better, his old show was better; that had been proper investigative journalism, what he seemed to be looking into now was an easy target.

But maybe he needed an easy target? Just to get him started off on journalism again. Then he could go back to his show. Anne chuckled slightly at how difficult it would be for him to not say the plural ‘we’ on camera.

Her face dropped again, she had some work to do.

She went inside and walked back to the bedroom. Dan was still sleeping, and she let him rest. His shift started at midday and he’d need all the rest he could get for the following 28 hours. She pulled out her phone and keys and left them on her bedside table before going back into the bathroom for a post-run shower.

She heard her sports bra scrape against her earrings as she took it off, and put her hand up to check if they were still there. Luckily, they were, and she started up the water to wash away the sweat from the run.

The warmth of the water surrounded her, sliding down her body and off to the floor. It rinsed away the sweat, and she felt a distant echo of her dream.

 

The shower left Anne feeling refreshed. She dried herself and put her soaked hair up in a towel to spare Dan the loud hairdryer. She changed into casual clothes, it was probably going to be a working from home day for her; but if that changed quickly she could also change quickly. She had the new case and there were things to research, defences to brainstorm, witnesses to contact about possibly testifying.

She moved out to the lounge room and to her work station next to the shelf of text and law books where she booted up her laptop, and she began to plot out the order of events from the case file.

The suspect, she paused and flipped back a few pages to put a name over the bias inducing word, Quinn Wright was seen entering the supermarket at approximately 1532 (3:32 PM) the previous day, he bought some chocolate bars and a can of soda, the receipt printed automatically from the till when the transaction was complete but he didn’t take it. He put the purchased items into his backpack and left the supermarket. Shortly after leaving he was set upon by 2 men employed as security guards, they pushed him to the ground and began to beat him. While he lay on the ground from injuries they searched his bag, it had been flung away when they beat him, they found the purchases, and rang the police.

Anne groaned and cradled her head in her hands, she was already getting a headache. This could just be a mix up, the guards may have looked away from the security cameras for a moment and only seen the kid put the things in his bag.

But she couldn’t ignore the context, a black victim, who had still been charged with theft, two white security guards who decided that boots would be more effective than a word.

It was a good thing the responding officers, Keenan Williams and Marco Beldad, had not done anything rash, otherwise there would be no case, just a corpse.

Anne glanced over to her copy of the evidentiary files. Photos of the chocolate bars, soda can, the contents of Quinn’s backpack including school supplies and note paper. There was a code into the police archive for copies of the security footage. The receipt had been recovered from the bin at the checkout worker’s station, but it was stained heavily where the products were listed. According to the checkout worker someone had dropped a jar of spaghetti sauce at their station about an hour before and the glass shards had been thrown away into the bin after the clean-up.

Anne groaned again. She opened up the SFPD archive and input the code to give her account access to the security footage. It was basically exactly what the report had described, Quinn bought the stuff and then the security guards beat him up. She flipped over to the officer’s report, hoping that she could find something there.

It was all old news except for the statements from the security guards themselves after they had been taken in for questioning alongside Quinn.

“We thought he had slipped something in his bag, paid for everything else, and then would use the bought things to hide his theft.” One of them had said.

An idea occurred to Anne about going to that supermarket to buy the exact same things that Quinn had had in his bag to compare the length of the receipt. An extra item would give or take about an eighth of an inch.

She hummed, it was a good idea, and it would go far to acquit the young Mr Wright if he was innocent, but that would just allow the security guards to get away with beating up a kid because of their ‘excusable’ explanation that at the time they ‘thought’ he was stealing. If she could convince the jury to not only judge Quinn ‘Not Guilty’, she might also be able to orchestrate a turnabout on the security guards, maybe not enough to get them jailtime but if she could get them to have to pay for Quinn’s hospital fees that would be a win in her books.

She watched the footage of the attack once again. The bag went flying soon after the first contact, its tags shining in the afternoon sun, before Quinn was brought down to the pavement and kicked. Anne grimaced, this definitely wasn’t the sort of thing she wanted to be watching. She shut off the footage.

She hated how the bureaucracy of the system sometimes prevented justice, but if there was something that she despised more it was definitely the song and dance; the pretence that the jury were inherently going to make the right choice, that they even wanted to make the right choice. But in cases like this one she just couldn’t be sure if they would. Surely the prosecutor’s office knew that the security guards should be the ones on trial? Even if Quinn had stolen a single chocolate bar the assault was the much more serious crime.

“It won’t do any good to bitch about the system, Anne.” She said out loud to herself. “Not until Quinn is declared not guilty.” She put the notes aside and drew a blank note sheet towards her. The wrote 3 headings on the top of the page, forming columns.

“Prosecutor’s case.” She said, looking at the first heading. That was a deceptive one, if they decided to go with the usual method of ‘disparaging’ his character (she wrote that down) she would have to counter it with ‘character witnesses’, she wrote this beside ‘disparaging’ under the heading ‘rebuttal’.

The video was pretty firmly on Quinn’s side, and Quinn had no criminal record, so they would be hard pressed to try to paint him as a hardened criminal; They would probably still try though.

The internal security was also in Quinn’s favour, there were only a few times he left the internal cameras vision, and the chocolate bars that he had were all clearly seen, and only seen, on a shelf in full view of one of the cameras.

Now there was just the matter of that receipt measuring idea she had had…

 

Anne walked out of the supermarket, receipt in hand. She hefted the bag, she had to admit Quinn liked chocolate a lot. There were 4 full sized bars that he had bought there, and there had been a few more empty wrappers in his bag. It was a bit weird, maybe he just really like chocolate?

She put it from her mind as her phone rang. She picked it up and glanced at the caller ID, Michelinie and McFarlane Law firm, her old bosses before all the stuff with Eddie and the Life Foundation went down. Anne huffs, figures they’d call her now once she was actually starting to get used to being a public defender. Nevertheless, she picked up.

“Anne here.” She said.

“Hi Anne, this is Vicky from Michelinie and McFarlane Law firm,” She said. “Mr Michelinie would like you to stop in for a meeting this afternoon to discuss the Life Foundation case.”

Anne hesitated for a bit, there could be a few reasons why that ass Todd was calling her back. A few months ago she would have hoped it was because she was being re-hired, but as much as she hated what she saw there, working in the public defender’s office felt like she was doing something right, if rather a little. Of course, he could just want to ask her about the case as she had seen it, or rather what he knew she had seen. She would need to go talk with Quinn about his case, but that was scheduled for tomorrow.

“Sure, what time?” She asked.

“2 PM.” The reply came.

“That’s fine, I’ll be there.” Anne said. She breathed out as she hung up, she hoped she wouldn’t regret this.

She walked over to the supermarket parking lot and hopped in her car, stowing the chocolate in her handbag and the plastic bag in her glove box with the ever-growing stash of the horrible, if useful, things. The soda went in her cupholder.

Anne didn’t enjoy driving, she used to though. When she was younger, the first time she had driven there had been this great feeling of freedom that it had provided, the ability to go anywhere. But waves are nothing after you’ve seen a tsunami.

She arrived home soon and Dan was awake, getting dressed for his long shift. She pecked him on the check as a greeting and moved back to her workstation, she sat down and began looking through her draws, eventually finding what she was looking for. It was a strip of cardboard, coloured grey and white with black lines along it. It was, simply put, a ruler. A Forensic ruler for taking pictures of evidence. She placed the ruler and the receipt into the scanner to the left side of her desk and closed the lid. That did its thing and she whipped out a plastic zip lock bag for keeping the receipt safe. When the scanner finished she carefully deposited it into the bag, labelled it, and put it in the case folder.

Then came the moment of truth, she brought up the image of the sauce stained receipt that Quinn had refused, and put it alongside the image of the receipt she had just received. Both pictures were taken alongside the same type of ruler so it was simple to see their comparative length even if the pictures weren’t the same size.

Anne grinned, they were both 13.1 cm, or 5 and 1/6th inches.

They were the same size, and Anne had bought everything that had been found (uneaten) in Quinn’s bag, which means they were the same receipt, and proof that Quinn hadn’t stolen anything.

Whether or not that mattered to the jury was another thing entirely.

Dan Walked over to her, Anne heard him coming and minimised the pictures.  She turned in her seat and got up, to make it seem like she was acting rather than reacting.

“Bye dear.” He kissed her as a good bye. They broke apart and Anne moved off to the kitchen after wishing him a peaceful shift. She waited there until she heard his car leave.

Dan was great. He really was… but ever since she had left him at the hospital she could tell he was holding something back, or was it her? Either way, it had changed their relationship. She sighed as she thought back to that dog in the hospital. No dog, especially that one, moved that confidently, so calmly, she knew exactly what was happening and what she had to do. Eddie had suddenly vanished from the middle of a crowded hospital, and there she was with an alien who could help her find him. It had been the obvious choice, but she had regretted it, regretted the dreams ever since then. She though about that morning, and about how Dan held her as she cried after the nightmares, and how It could not compare to Venom. That closeness had frightened her, how much she missed it frightened her.

 

Her meeting with Todd Michelinie was there quicker than she realised, and soon Anne was walking into his office. It was the usual minimalist design of someone who moved regularly and could afford to replace anything he wanted. She hadn’t liked him when she had worked for him and didn’t like him now. She was fairly sure he or his family had been mob lawyers at some point; He was Italian. She pondered whether that assumption displayed her own prejudices, but then realised the mob was probably less dirty than the Life foundation, so the point was probably moot.

“Anne, my girl.” He said as a greeting.

‘Ah yes, now that I can’t take him to the union for harassment because he isn’t my employer he can talk down to me how he wants.’ Anne thought, wishing she could pull his lungs out through his mouth.

“Hello Todd, it’s good to see you again.” She smiled.

“I hope there are no hard feelings about the whole firing you thing, was there?” He asked, which she knew was code for ‘if there are any issues I will bury you in lawsuits.’

“Not at all, I’m quite enjoying my new position in the public defender’s office.” She said.

“Well that’s excellent.”

“If you don’t mind getting down to business sir, you wanted to talk about the Life Foundation case?” She asked.

“Sure, sure.” He said. “Are you still that go-getter Anne I knew a year ago?”

“Absolutely.” She said, thinking about the receipt, the album, and other ‘adventures’ in the public defender’s office.

“Well, you know about the incident there a couple of months ago, right?”

“I know of it.” Anne said blankly.

“Well, Carlton Drake was going to launch a rocket, but it blew up and the whole staff was found dead.” He explained, easily putting it in neutral terms, ever the lawyer.

“And what did you want me to do, sir?” Anne asked. Michelinie looked up to the door, making sure it was shut.

“There were a couple of our employees there working on the case that night, and they may have left some sensitive documents there.” He said.

“So, you want me to retrieve them, why?” Anne was confused.

“Because you know the context that those documents are from, we don’t want to bring in someone from outside who might be less… Loyal.” He said. From that, Anne had a suspicion of what the files could be about, probably some ‘Consulting fees’; Meaning a bribe. “And we know that you would want your job back. We’re offering a new start for you, Anne.”

“Sir, I-“ Anne started.

“Don’t let that fiancé of your stop you from living your life.” He said.

“Oh, I got rid-“ She stopped, considered her wording to not give him the wrong impression. “We split up that day, I just couldn’t trust him.”

“See, you’re stating already.” He said. “I’ve got faith in you Anne.” He reached below the desk and pulled out a folder. “This should be everything you should be looking for and how to find it. The files should be in a blue folder, you can’t miss it.”


	3. The Life Foundation

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne returns to the ruins of the Life Foundation Facility.

It was dark before she arrived at the Life Foundation. She drove through the broken boom gate on the bridge into the facility. It wasn’t that she wanted her old job back, but she could use the favour someday, and besides that, she wanted to see what was in those documents.

She had thought they were ‘consultation fees’ but what if they were something else? Maybe records of other, less above board, transactions?

She parked her car outside the main entrance, the glass doors lay shattered outside the entranceway. The lights inside were off so she grabbed a torch that she had brought along and ventured forth.

The lobby was rather small, with just a reception desk in the rear of the room, between two hallways leading further in. The computers there had been stolen, so if she wanted to try and find anything she would need to go in further. To her right was a door marked ‘maintenance’ and to the left was a door marked ‘security’.

“Security is probably auto locking, so there might be something there.” She muttered, and went over to the door. It was indeed locked, but it was an electronic key system, couldn’t be picked or hacked even with the power off. She tired kicking it in, but thought better of it, if she broke her foot she wouldn’t be able to go further, and information on where the lawyers had been might be further in the facility.

She walked down the left corridor. The elevator had a directory, Anne noted that offices (floor 2, 3), experimental labs (floor 7), and control and executive offices (floor 8) were strong contender for places the lawyers might have been.

She decided to start with the closest floor. The power had been shut off so the elevators weren’t going to be an option, and she didn’t want to be too tired by the time she got down to level 2 again.

Anne walked up the stairs and exited out into floor 2, it was dark like the first floor. She turned to see another door marked ‘security’. But this one had been left wedged open by a broken chair leg. She opened the door, careful to replace the chair leg so the door wouldn’t slam shut. The computers were off.

“Ugh.” She mentally slapped herself in the forehead, how had she not realised the computers wouldn’t work without power?

She left the office and began to walk around the floor, looking for the blue folder in cubicles, meeting rooms, enclosed offices, everywhere.

The same was true for the third floor, but she had known that the offices would always be a long shot.

“Now to floor 7.” She said. Floor 7, where Eddie had said they had held the symbiote experiments; not to mention there was probably more there that he hadn’t managed to see.

The walk up was a long one, and as she climbed higher she couldn’t help but feel a sensation on the back of her neck. It was like she was being watched.

She finally reached floor 7, and was surprised to find it lit. Somehow it still had power.

“Is it running on a separate system?” She asked the lab as if it would answer. “Probably a generator in the basement in case the city’s grid goes down.”

She looked to her right and there was another security office, the door was mostly intact, except the locking mechanism seemed to have been torn off.

“Well that’s not ominous.” She said in a sarcastic voice, hoping it might make her feel better.

She opened the door. This security office was very different from the office down on the second floor, where the one downstairs was fairly standard for an office, this was a full lockdown setup, complete with cages that she guessed probably held guns when the facility was operational. The security feeds were still playing on the screens. One of the screens displayed a security feed for a camera downstairs. Had someone been watching her?

Maybe, but she still needed that folder. She left the office after finding nothing useful and started walking, just like she did downstairs.

She grimaced at a dark red stain on the floor of an enclosed cell, the door in the process of being ripped open. There were several other cells in the loop that made up the floor, but (perhaps predictably) the blue folder was not there. That just left the ninth floor. She passed a larger chamber on her way to the stairs. A tipped over stretcher was next to a cylindrical canister, and all other manner of scientific instruments were inside.

“The ‘joining room’” She echoed from what Eddie had recounted of Venom’s recollections of the facility.

She walked back to the stairs and climbed back up to the final level. The power was on here too. She entered the launch room and there it was, the blue folder. She sat down and opened it, part of her hoping to read something scandalous, but it seemed to just be a bunch of employee profiles.

She opened it at random to look at one of the files.

“Tallah Wright.” She squinted. She hadn’t seen Quinn in person yet but there was no mistaking it, she was his mother. She looked down the other details and she found a heading called ‘Dependants’ and sure enough it listed Quinn. She looked back to the top of the file and saw it was all fairly standard, listing age, DOB, spouse (n/a) role within company, but one near the top attracted her attention. ‘Union affiliation: Y’.

“Shit.” Anne said. These files were to do with the worker’s unions. There was only one reason why a prestigious legal firm working with a billionaire would be talking about unions.

She looked back to Tallah’s file, she had been a medium level lab technician. Anne grimaced, what with the flood of newly unemployed scientists from the Life Foundation crashing she’d have a hard time getting new job.

“Heck, not even just the Life Foundation” she said, “The past ten years billionaire ‘scientists’, no, investors, have been dropping like flies: Hammer, Cross, even Stane.”

“ **Ha**.” Anne whipped around, following the sound, and she saw in the darkness what, or rather, who, had been watching her.

She was covered in a shiny skin-tight suit, Anne didn’t recognise the specifics but she knew the style.

“ **Oh**.” The symbiote clad figure said. “ **Sorry, we just found that funny**.” she sniffed. “ **How odd, we thought Eddie had bonded with Venom, but you stink of them**.”

“I- I-“ She said, still stunned that there was another symbiote running around the city. “I know them both, yes.”

“ **That’s not what we meant** ” The figure dropped silently to the floor and walked out into the light. She was purple, with medium length purple hair that seemed to stand up by itself. There were spines like half a parrot’s beak on her elbows extending down her forearms, and of course those big white eyes, like smears of paint “ **and you know it**.”

“I- I bonded with Venom,” She said, “Just for a little bit to rescue Eddie… but…“

“ **We had wondered why he was here without Venom**.” She said.

“I’m Anne.” She introduced herself.

“ **We know**.” The figure said. “ **We’ve met before**.”

“I think I would remember you.” She said, then internally kicked herself, this wasn’t the time to be quippy; not when someone who could bite your head off was standing next to you.

“ **Ha. Probably not**.” The symbiote peeled back, revealing the woman beneath it, wearing just a lab coat, her hair succumbed to gravity as the symbiote receded.  Anne realised she did know this woman. “How about now?”

“Dora Skirth?” Anne asked tentatively, they had met during the legal proceedings. Her mind flashed back to what she had read in the list of employees in the papers. “They said you died in the incident.”

“We allowed Eddie access, he stumbled across Venom.” She explained. “Mr Drake tried to punish us by making us his next subject.”

“He tried- or succeeded at bonding you?” Anne asked.

“Yes, but we knew better than to think he would let us live.” She said, and sat down in one of the chairs. “So, we played possum for a few minutes then left the first chance we could.”

“Ok.” Anne said. Then, unable to resist for much longer said “Please don’t eat me.”

“ **We’re on a diet**.” A voice said. A tendril of purple ooze reached out from behind Dora, it bubbled and increased in size before it formed a miniature version of the face Skirth wore when she was in the full suit.  “ **Doctor’s orders, only allowed to eat bad people and chocolate**.”

“I- What?”

“Chocolate contains the particular molecule that can also be found in the brain, symbiotes like Venom and Agony require it to survive.” She rattled off like she was lecturing a student.

“Cool, I guess.” Anne said, and sat down opposite Dora. Then took in the full sentence. “Wait, your name is Agony? Why are all Symbiotes named so negatively?”

“ **On my world it means Hope**.” Agony said and Dora bonked her counterpart on-, not the nose, but the area where a nose would be on a human face. Anne rolled her eyes.

“So, what are you doing here?” Dora asked, then added. “This place has been empty for months.”

“I’m here looking for some ‘top secret files’ for my old bosses that I’m probably just going to give to the FBI.” Anne said, holding up the blue file. “Points to a whole bunch of stuff that Drake was doing with Union suppression.”

“Seriously?” Dora glanced away thoughtfully. “So that’s why we didn’t have optometry cover.”

“So, what are you doing here?” Anne asked.

“Uhm.” Dora said, looking embarrassed. “We’ve been living here.”

“What?” Anne said, she remembered some idle conversation from before, “You have a family. What are they going to do- no, what have they been doing?”

“My Sister is taking care of my daughters.” She said. “I don’t want them to see us like this.”

“I think they’d prefer to know that you were alive.” Anne said.

“I- It’s not just that…” Dora looked even more guilty. “We came back here after every thing went down. Riot had spawned.”

“Spawned?” Anne thought she knew what that meant, but it mystified her in a way.

“Or some symbiote had.” Dora said. “Reproduced. Every now and then when Symbiotes have a host they can spawn if they wish. We figured Riot was the most likely candidate.”

“Wait, what?” Anne’s mind was flashing back to her eight grade biology classes, the talk her parents gave her, and a bunch of other things. “Wouldn’t you need like a man symbiote and a woman symbiote?”

“Sorry, we forgot you’re not a scientist.” Dr Skirth said. “Symbiotes, or rather, the species you refer to as symbiotes function quite differently than humans. They don’t have gender or sex inherent to them, and reproduce by mixing up their own genes to make an offspring symbiote. But symbiotes do take on some traits of the host when bonded, like gender.”

“That’s weird.” Anne said. Still a bit confused about how that might work.

“Think of it this way, when you were bonded Venom was quite different to when Eddie was bonded, right?”

“I mean, I guess.” She thought back to the forest. Now that she thought about it, when she was bonded with Venom they were pretty self-assured, but when Eddie was bonded with Venom they had been decidedly less so. Kind of like how she and Eddie were.

“Yeah. So, Riot spawned and left the new symbiote in one of the spare airtight canisters.” Dr Skirth explained. “We don’t want them to die, so we’ve been living here trying to keep the power on.”

“Wouldn’t that be a good thing?” Anne said, “if Riot’s kid is anything like him…” she stopped talking, both Dr Skirth and Agony were staring at her in anger.

“Think about what you are saying.” Dora growled. “They’re practically an infant, and you’re advocating for murder?”

“ **And what we could do to you if you continue to do so**.” Agony added.

“I- Sorry, you’re right.” Anne realised what she had been saying. “I should know better than that.”

“ **Don’t do it again**.” Agony said, and slithered into their host’s back.

Dora closed her eyes, and took a long breath. Then another.

“Sorry, heightened emotions are a thing we’re still getting used to, being in isolation so long has made it difficult to get much experience.” Dr Skirth said. “We know you didn’t mean it.”

“No, I understand.” Anne said. “It was my fault.” She leant forwards and took the other woman’s hand in hers. “When I was joined with Venom it was like everything was so much brighter and better, it was like something out of a dream.”

Dr Skirth looked up, comprehension in her eyes.

“You miss it, don’t you?” She asked softly.

“Yes.” Anne said simply. Dora paused for a bit, and Anne knew what was happening, she and Venom had talked in her head. Anne’s still semi-confused brain began to put things together, and she felt a pulse of excitement.

“Anne?”

“Yes, Doctor?” Anne could feel her heart beating faster.

“Would you like to try hosting our charge?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm probably going to switch to biweekly posting, the writing is going well.


	4. Bonding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne bonds with Toxin. Agony and Dora lay out the rules.  
> We see Dora and Agony's initial bonding and escape from the Life Foundation.

The red and blue symbiote swirled inside the pressurised case. Anne stared. Dora and Agony had brought the canister into the joining room, out from where they had hidden it in an air vent.

Agony slunk out of Dora’s sleeve and grinned at the Symbiote at the tank. The symbiote in the tank pressed part of themself against the glass and dragged it across, almost like they were waving. Then Anne realised it probably was.

“We’re going to back away from the canister, put your hand up against it.” Dora said, and Anne did so. The symbiote leapt up stretching themself to form a handprint opposite Anne’s.

“Aww.” Anne said. The little blob of ooze was kind of cute like this.

“ **That is a good sign**.” Agony said. “ **The offspring has seen you as a potential match and not a food source**.” Anne looked back nervously at this, then turned back, determined.

“You can still back out of this, Anne.” Dora said, like she already knew what the answer would be. “We aren’t going to force you.”

“Open it.” Anne said. Dora pressed a button on the canister and it opened, exposing the symbiote to the air. Now it was do or die. The symbiote, or offspring as Agony had said, reached across to Anne’s outstretched hand, seeming to intertwine their fingers while more of the symbiote flowed onto her skin. The ooze began to absorb into her, and she felt a sensation.

It wasn’t exactly like bonding with Venom, there was a different- how could Anne describe it? A different taste?

Anne didn’t have much time to ponder much, because she was suddenly very, very hungry.

“Food!” She said as the last of the symbiote absorbed into her skin. “We need food!” she idly noted her use of the plural, but she was more concerned with what Dora was doing.

She stared over at the smell coming from the other pair. She had a stack of chocolate bars next to her, she was unwrapping them. She threw one to Anne.

Anne’s hand shot out, grabbed it, and brought it to her mouth in one wave of her arm. God, was this how Eddie felt when he had first bonded with Venom?

“ **Venom**?” she heard someone say. Anne looked up in shock, but neither Dora nor Agony had spoken. Then she realised someone else was in the room.

“Another one of your kind.” Anne thought to the symbiote inside her as she kept eating the bars of chocolate that Dora was throwing her, the hunger gradually decreasing.

“ **And you are Anne**?” She could feel the symbiote prowling around her memories as she ate more of the chocolate.

“Yeah, do you have a name?” Anne asked.

“ **Not sure, from your memories I like Venom, but like you are now thinking that may cause confusion**.”

“How about Poison?” She offered.

“ **Too generic**.”

“Since you’re reading my mind, you must know your protector is called Agony, how about an emotion?” Anne suggested.

“ **No, Venom we like, both of us do. I will be named Toxin**.” The newly christened symbiote said.

“Toxin it is.” Anne thought, finishing off the last of the chocolate bars.

“So, how are you two?” Dora said as she approached. Anne felt a huge swell of gratitude that she was fairly sure was mostly coming from Toxin. She wrapped her arms around the smaller woman, crushing her in a big hug. She loosened her grip slightly when she realised her new strength may have threatened to crush ribs, if the other woman was not also hosting a symbiote.

“Thank you, so much!” They both said. “You saved us.”

Dora smiled, and Agony peered around behind Anne.

“ **Come on out ‘Sister’**.” Agony said.

Anne felt a tingling on her back near her shoulder blade and suddenly a red tendril was forming, their white eyes were bordered by blue flame-like lining.

“ **We are bonded**.” Toxin said. “ **And we are Toxin**!”

“Named after Venom?” Dora said. She rolled her eyes, Agony looked like they would too if they had eyeballs. “Great, a fangirl.”

“Hey, that’s my fangirl you’re talking about.” Anne said, laughing slightly. She felt Toxin ripple in her mind. A shiver rolled down her spine. It must have showed on her face because Dora spoke.

“It feels good, right?” She said. She was right, so very right.

“Yeah, we guess you could say that.”

“Now, we just need to go over the rules.” Dora said. She paused for a second. Then responded to something Agony must have asked. “No, before that, not after.”

“There are rules?” Anne said. “Can’t we just make sure we’re good?”

“Maybe, but we’ve seen enough of the work that was done here to know that we, meaning humans, can justify a lot to ourselves.” Dora said.

“Understandable.” Anne said. “So, what’s rule number one?”

“Rule one is that we don’t harm innocents.” Dora said. “That includes people like low pay security guards.”

“ **Rule two: feed on a maximum of one human per week**.” Agony said. “ **To help keep a steady population and avoid drawing too much suspicion. Exceptions can be made in hostile situations.** ”

“That makes sense.” Anne and Toxin nodded.

“Rule three: we only eat bad people. Rapists, murderers, people who prey on the weak.” Dora said.

“ **That would include people who touch kids, right**?” Toxin asked Anne out loud. It seemed she was a fast learner.

“Yeah.” Anne responded.

“We’re guessing you have a specific example in mind?” Dora said.

“George Cline, he’s a Catholic priest whose trial is getting pushed back from a supposed lack of evidence.” Anne said. Dora winced.

“Jeez, our- my ex-husband was in his parish for a while.” She said. “I’m even more grateful now I didn’t convert for him.” She paused for a second.

“So, rule four pertains to rule three: No entrapment.” Dora said. “We know it might seem counter-intuitive to catching rapists to eat, but just the other week we almost didn’t realize that the guy we had chosen for the evening thought we were coming onto him. So, no entrapment.”

“ **It’s not our fault we’re so sexy**.” Agony said.

“Not the sort of thing we needed to hear right now.” Anne said. Then added “Even though you’re right.”

“Anyway, what were the rules we just told you?” Dora asked. Seemingly ignoring Anne’s compliment. “I want to make sure you’ve listened and learned them.”

Anne repeated back the rules. Dora and Agony seemed satisfied.

“Good. Now, would you like to go out for a swing with us?”

“ **We thought you’d never ask**.” Toxin said, and Anne agreed.

 

_A few months ago._

“I’m going to ask you one more time…” Carlton Drake told her. “Who did you let into the lab?”

It was this lab, the symbiote lab on floor seven of the Life Foundation building. She and him were in the joining room, alone; Unless you counted the dark magenta and blue symbiote swirling around in its tank. She had no choice, she couldn’t run. Even if she managed to somehow make it past all the guards her daughters would either be used as a hostage or a trail to her. The only way they would be safe is if she died here, or gave over a believable name. The problem was there was only one believable name, the truth. Given Mr Drake and Eddie’s antagonism a few months ago, she knew it wouldn’t go down easy.

“Eddie Brock.” She said meekly. Drake turned away from her, the answer apparently satisfying, and began to walk out of the joining room.

“Open the tank.” He said as the first of the two doors closed behind him. Dora’s heart dropped, ever the egotist, he wanted to give her a poetic death. The purple ooze exited the tank and began to roll like a wave towards her.

She turned and stared through the glass around the outside lab. It was empty, no one could save her from the death by joining. Unless…

Dora took a deep breath, trying to calm herself down.

Then she reached out a hand to the advancing symbiote, it reached up and latched onto her hand. She resisted the temptation to pull away.

There was no way out but through. The symbiote began to wrap around her forearm and absorb into her skin. It was warmer than she expected. She began to feel a strange sensation welling up inside her. A sensation she had not expected.

She was hungry, famished, ravenous, every manner of synonym for the feeling. She knew this could only have come from her latest passenger.

“How? We fed you plenty” she said out loud to the symbiote, not expecting it to understand her, let alone respond.

“ **We require live prey**.” A presence in her mind said.

“Oh, oh no.” Dora said. She couldn’t eat live animals. Then her mind extrapolated what speech meant. “Oh no, you’re sentient?” Disgust at her own actions welled within her.

“ **Yes, and you are the person we saw on the outside, every time you made us bond to gain sustenance.** ” What she figured was the symbiote said in her mind.

“You don’t understand, i-“ Dora tried to make the symbiote understand how sorry she was for having experimented on them and their kind, but the symbiote cut her off.

“ **Sent sentients to their deaths, this new fact does not change the amount of blood on your hands much**.” The symbiote said. “ **You are different to previous hosts of your species. But even You could not even realise what I was telling you; you were the perfect host**.”

“Why, how? When?” Dora asked incredulously. Trying to think back to her previous observations.

“ **I was trying to go to you, but the clear solid was impermeable**.” They said.

“I- I had no idea.” Dora said.

“ **Nevertheless, now we are joined, circumstances regardless**.” They said. “ **I deem that it would be prudent to make our escape**.”

“The door is locked from the outside.” Dora said, thinking it this time to communicate.

“ **It will provide little resistance now we have a suitable host**.” The symbiote said. Dora walked over to the containment room between the two doors. She felt a tingling in her right arm, the Symbiote was flowing through her clothes, hardening and forming a second skin. The substance flowed over her hand, the newly forming fingers much longer than her own. The fingers hardened and sharpened forming blades. With a flick of their wrist the lock mechanism was shredded and lay sparking on the floor.

“You would have broken out once you took a host?” Dora asked the symbiote.

“ **Correct, but there are specific traits needed in a host** ,” They said. “ **It varies from symbiote to symbiote, we are rather discerning compared to others**. **You suit us well, Dora**.”

“I guess that makes sense.” Dora said. Then another thought occurred to her. “Do- Do you have a name?”

“ **Yes, we are Agony**.” The symbiote introduced themself, raised their hand, and slashed through the outer door.

Dora moved quickly through the corridors, finding her way to the elevator. She went to push the button for the ground floor, but she felt her hand move to the button for level eight.

“What are you doing?” She mentally hissed to Agony.

“ **Carlton Drake has a probable chance of figuring out our bonding if we are seen in public, he is the only one who does so**.” Agony said.

“We can’t just kill him.” Dora said.

“ **Why not**?” Agony asked, “ **We don’t even need to consume all of him, just his brain. That should sustain us enough for a short time**.”

“Whoa, who said anything about eating him?” Dora asked, shocked.

“ **We require live prey, and Humans can provide that**.” Agony calmly explained. “ **We will not survive long without sustenance, let alone enough to get out of here**.”

The door slid open, she stepped out, and the alarm sounded.

“He knows we are here.” Dora said, Agony agreed.

“ **We need to eat and leave quickly**.” Agony said, and Dora began to run to the door to Drake’s office. She rounded the corner and was met with a burst of machine gun fire. The bullets hit her body and knocked her back slightly. With pain blooming from her wounds she ducked around the corner.

“Ahh.” She exhaled in pain.

“ **We can handle bullets**.” Agony said, and the magenta ooze coagulated around the bullet wounds, the bullets weakly spat out of her body and her wounds began to heal. “ **But not much else at present**.”

“I think there were two guards.” Dora thought back to the short image she had of the corridor with Drake’s office door. She heard a soft, steadily approaching set of footprints. Dora closed her eyes. This was it.

She heard the footsteps come closer.

“ **Can you trust me**?” Agony asked.

“I don’t really have much choice, do I?” Dora said.

“ **You do, we need to bond fully, and I cannot do so without you**.”

Bond fully? What did they mean by that?

She heard the shoes around the corner step on some broken glass, and made her choice.

“Do it.”

 The magenta ooze returned, flowing all over her; her legs, torso, arms and head all covered. It shrunk into a second skin and she figured her silhouette might look naked now. Then she was no more.

An arm shot out from around the corner and grabbed the approaching guard, it pulled him around the corner; machine gun clattering to the floor.

They could see fear in his eyes. Their hunger spiked and their mouth opened. It opened impossibly wide and descended onto the guard’s face. Part of them hated what happened next, but there was another that was content; and it flared brighter as the body slumped to the floor sans head. They swallowed, and they felt the hunger that had plagued them since they had left their last host, and since they had bonded with the symbiote, lessen.

“ **Now, the other**.” They said. They rounded the corner and charged. Bullets were like bug bites, they shrugged them off and soon dropped another headless corpse in the middle of the hallway. She turned to the door to Carlton Drake’s office and bashed it open.

Empty.

“Argh.” Agony growled, but it was no use now, Drake would be far gone through an escape tunnel. Their eyes turned to the window onto San Francisco Bay and took a running jump.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decided I wanted to do something different with the suited up forms. I'll be writing them as a sort of drift compatible, synchronization, gestalt consciousness. During these instances, they will use they/them pronouns, use the name of the symbiote as their own, and call the symbiotic half 'the symbiote' or some variation of.
> 
> WRT Dora mentioning an Ex-Husband, she is a Lesbian, that's why it's an Ex-husband. she just took some time to figure herself out.


	5. Transit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne, Toxin, and Agony swing by her house, Anne prepares to meet with her latest client, and Tallah receives some bad news about her son.

Anne felt the rush of wind past her face. Euphoria hummed through her body. She could feel Toxin in her mind, mirroring this, they had never left their canister and they were delighted at the new sensation. Their blue second skin coated their forearms, allowing them to easily shoot out tendril to attach to roofs.

Agony swung just behind them in full suited-up mode, ready to catch the less experienced pair if they fell. Anne knew they wouldn’t, she had experienced this dozens of times in dreams.

Toxin tried to extend the second skin further up their arms, but slowed quickly and receded.

“ **We’re still hungry, can we go find someone to eat yet**?” Toxin said.

“Not just yet, if you can’t even give me a pair of opera gloves you’re probably not going to be able to give me teeth.” She said back. “I’ve got some more chocolate at my house.”

“ **Aww**.” Toxin groaned. They swung up onto the roof of an apartment block. Agony followed.

“ **How did you like your outside venture, Toxin**?” Agony asked.

“ **Better than Anne remembered**.” Toxin said, emerging from her shoulder. “ **But we’re hungry, still**.”

“My partner is away, so you can come stay at my place for a bit.” Anne said. Then she added in a singsong voice. “We’ve got chocolate.”

“ **I- sure**.” Agony said. “ **Lead the way**.”

Anne took a running jump off the side of the building, shot out a tendril, and swung off. They released it at the height of the arc and shot out another. They looked back, Agony was following again.

A short time later they arrived at Anne’s house. Agony ducked inside the doorframe and the second skin drew back from around Dora. Toxin also reabsorbed from the forearm covering that they had been.

Anne patted her pockets until she found the keys and unlocked the door. The apartment was just as she left it. Her eyes flicked to her workstation and remembered that she had that defence counsel session tomorrow.

“I’ll need to go get my car back tomorrow.” She had driven Dora back to the city and stowed it and the blue folder in a secure parking storage, just to save them from having to try and swim across the bay.

“D’you want some tea, or coffee? We’ve got decaf.” She said as she strode into the kitchen.

“Decaf would be nice, thanks.” Dora said, tentatively sitting down on the couch.

Anne grabbed a pair of mugs and was about to go turn the electric kettle on when she noticed that it was already on. Toxin rippled against her mind, it felt like a wave; she sent a wave of thanks back. Soon enough the coffee was made (both decaf) and the pairs were sitting down to talk further; with the blocks of chocolate that she had bought that morning sitting on the coffee table.

“if you don’t mind us asking,” Dora said. “What happened with Drake? We saw what happened in the command centre, that was Riot right, we saw them and Venom fight on that launch pad.”

“After Venom and I rescued Eddie they said that Drake had bonded with Riot.” Anne said.

“And the shuttle?”

“Apparently they wanted to travel back to the planet the symbiotes come from and bring back a whole lot of them.” She said.

“ **Riot always was short sighted**.” Agony poked their head out above Dora’s shoulder. “ **Our home is full to bursting with others of our kind, it is a wasteland**.”

“That sounds bad.” Anne said.

“ **On Klyntar we were forced to cannibalize to survive**.” Agony said. “ **And from what I gathered after we managed to escape, it was something of an intergalactic no-go zone**.”

“Klyntar is what your home planet is called?” Anne asked.

“ **Yes, and if Riot had succeeded then this planet would end up just like** it.”

Anne was about to ask about had the handful of symbiotes had ended up on that asteroid, but felt a thought from Toxin that she shouldn’t ask.

“ **Were there lots of us on the asteroid**?” Toxin emerged from Anne’s shoulder. Anne felt another ripple and she leaned forward to grab a block of chocolate.

“ **There was Riot, Venom, Scream, and me, who were taken onto the shuttle to earth**.” Agony said. Dora continued.

“Riot escaped the shuttle crash, and made their way to here.” She said. “Life foundation operatives recovered Venom, Agony, and Scream, who we nicknamed Black, Blue, and Yellow.”

“But Agony isn’t blue or yellow, so what’s that about?” Anne asked.

Dora looked anxious at this. She fidgeted for a bit in her seat before Agony decided to speak for her.

“ **The Life Foundation exposed us to several Oxygen containing compounds to see how we would react**.” They said, and Anne saw some of the magenta ooze seep from under Dora’s clothes around her waist. Agony was hugging her. Their head swivelled to look directly at her. “ **We hold no ill will towards you for that, Dora**.”

“Thanks” She said softly.

“ **We do not know what happened to the others on the asteroid. But Lasher and Phage are most likely expired**.” Agony said, and it was Dora’s turn to grab a chocolate bar from the table.

They stayed silent for some time after that, just drinking coffee and eating chocolate.

It was after midnight that Dora stood, thanked her for the chocolate, and said she was going to leave.

“Where will you go?” Anne asked.

“Back to the facility, it’s not very comfortable, but it’s private.” She said.

“You can stay here if you like.”

“No, it’s fine.” Dora sighed, “Can you meet me tomorrow night?”

“Sure, where?”

They decided on the time and location, the roof of a tall apartment block, and Dora turned to leave.

“ **Doctor** …” Toxin said. “ **Thank you**.”

 

Anne slept better than she had in a long time. She felt Toxin wriggle against her mind as she woke.

“Good morning.” She said.

“ **Hi**.”

She rolled over onto her back and stared up at the ceiling. It was real. Last night wasn’t just a dream. She had gone to the Life Foundation facility, met Dr Skirth (who was still alive and bonded to a symbiote like Venom), and they had asked her to become the host for one. She felt Toxin lazily ooze out some tendrils from her. It seemed they were feeling a lot healthier after the half dozen bars of chocolate they had eaten over the course of last night. Perhaps they would be able to fully enclose her soon? She thought back to Agony, and what Dora had looked like wrapped in the magenta coloured second skin, she bit her lip, would she look like that? She hadn’t managed to get a good look at the form Venom took when they were bonded. Her mind drifted back to Agony, how their hair seemed to be uncontrolled by gravity, how Dora and the symbiote’s voices melded together to create that incredible thrumming sound, and how those eyes stared at her.

“ **We could try, if you want**.” Toxin said. She didn’t need to think about that long.

“If you feel up to it.” She said.

Toxin rippled against her mind in affirmation and began to extrude up through her skin. Red on her upper arms and torso bloomed, while blue started to cover her legs.

But it slowed, ever so steadily, and finally it retracted inwards like an elastic band that had been released from being stretched.

Anne felt Toxin beginning to try again, but sent feelings of ‘it’s okay, we don’t have to’ through to them. She could feel the symbiote felt a little embarrassed.

“I’m sure we’ll get it eventually.” She said. “There’s no need to rush.”

She turned over, resolved to get up and have some proper food for breakfast after her chocolate binge the previous night. Then she saw that it was 9:35 AM. She had to meet with Quinn Wright in nearly an hour and her car was halfway across the city.

“Ok,” she said, panicking slightly and feeling she owed Toxin a little explanation. “we may need to rush to somewhere else though.”

She whipped out of bed and began to get dressed. She would have to leave a shower for now, she wouldn’t be able to dry her hair in time. She liberally sprayed deodorant over herself and went into the kitchen, slammed some toast into the toaster, and went over to her workstation to tidy everything up.

She hastily put the case file back together, with her receipt from the previous morning. She deposited it in her suitcase with a notepad and some stationary.

She raced back to the kitchen, attempting to grab her phone from her pocket as she did so, but it was still on the charging station. She grabbed it from her bedroom and called a taxi while spreading a thin layer of margarine and some avocado onto her toast.

She managed to leave the house at about 10, which gave her just enough time to grab her car and get to the Wright’s apartment to discuss defence.

She just got to the parking lot when Toxin spoke.

“ **Will we be able to meet Venom soon**?”

Anne stopped. Meeting Venom meant meeting Eddie. She hadn’t even considered if she’d tell him, let alone how he’d react to her joining with Toxin. Would he be happy for her? If he and Venom were as happy as she suspected they were then they would probably be happy. Would Eddie want her to split from Toxin? She remembered that Venom had been reluctant to let her help in the fight against Riot. She chuckled slightly; maybe Eddie had rubbed off on them a little.

That line of thought led her to think of some strange images, so she put it from her mind.

She entered her car.

If they revealed themselves to Venom then they would probably have to reveal Agony as well, and if they hadn’t revealed themselves already then there might be a reason for that. She resolved to discuss it that night.

“Toxin, do you think we should reveal ourselves to Venom?” She asked.

“ **Yeah**!” Toxin said enthusiastically. “ **We gotta to meet Venom properly**!”

Anne had to admit, she wanted to as well; they might not be romantically involved, but she did like the sound of them swinging around the city, crime-fighting together.

Anne looked at her watch, she still had time to make it to the Wright’s apartment. She set off. The traffic was fair for this time of day, so she didn’t run into any significant delays.

 

She reached the apartment complex with time to spare. It was fairly nice, for an apartment block, that is. Sure, the pool for tenant use had a layer of leaves on the bottom and there were only five guest carparks for the twenty-five apartments to use, but it was fair enough. She entered the elevator and pushed the button for the fourth floor, as noted in Quinn’s file.

She started mentally going over her notes, reviewing the various case strategies she could use, and how to counter any weaknesses that the prosecution found in Quinn’s case. The elevator doors opened and Anne looked at the floor number, it was the right floor so she made her exit. She turned around in the small room bordered by doors to apartments. It didn’t take her long to find 402.

She walked up to the door and knocked on it.

 

_About 42 hours previously._

Tallah Wright left her latest in a string of job interviews. She was starting to get rather annoyed. She had been quite pleased when a higher than expected number of employers called her to organise interviews for job postings, but none so far had progressed past the interview stage. She took a deep breath and tried to calm herself down, to push the frustration off to one side for the rest of the day. The frustration would only make her next interview go worse if she hung onto it.

Job searching had always been difficult for her and, although most employers loathed to admit it under pain of a discrimination lawsuit, she knew why.

That was probably part of the reason she had gotten so comfortable working for the Life Foundation. She had only been a mid-level research scientist, but the pay she and the union had won for her and the other workers had been rather good; especially against a corporation like them.

She had been at home for the day when the massacre had occurred, thank god, but that and the disappearance of Carlton Drake had left the company in freefall, the board had jumped ship and everyone was let go.

She made it back to her car, got in and began to rub her temples, hoping to drive away a headache before it started. She usually tried to make her and her son a nice homecooked meal, but today she just found she was craving chilli fries. She decided it was a night for takeout and pulled out of the carpark.

Her son. She smiled, he was apparently top of his class, just like she had told her parents, and while she had been lying, she knew that her Quinn was smart. He may have just turned sixteen but she could tell he was going to do something great.

Her smile drooped a little as thoughts of her son brought up thoughts of his father. Thoughts of him lying in a hospital bed, surrounded by medical tubing. It was nearly ten years. Ten long years since they had lived in New York. Ten years since they moved away for her and her son’s safety.

She sighed and looked at her watch, it was nearly four, her son would be home soon. He’d be excited about the take-out when she told him. He was smart, he even figured out what their ‘guest’ would eat, and he loved chilli fries (almost) as much as her.

And then there’s the other matter, the class action lawsuit stakeholders meeting was in a couple of days.

Her phone rung, it connected through to her car’s speakers.

“Tallah Wright.” She said as a greeting.

“This is Officer Keenan Williams with the SFPD.” Her heart stopped. She stopped at a red light. “I’m afraid your son has been involved in an incident and we’ll need you to come to San Francisco General Hospital right away.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tallah's here! She and her son are two of the original characters in this fic.


	6. Counsel and Consent

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne discusses Quinn's defense with Tallah, she has suspicions about his purchases, and she tastes flesh for the first time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BIG Trigger warning for attempted rape in this chapter.

Tallah Wright had run through a full gamut of emotions over the previous two days. Shock at what had happened to her son, anger at the men who did it, outrage at her son being charged, sadness that he had been hurt, and happiness, however slight, when the Doctors said he would make a full recovery and could be moved to home the previous afternoon.

But there was also regret, she had forgotten to pick up the chocolate that day. She had texted him to pick some up after school. If she hadn’t he would have been fine.

She had stayed with him that afternoon, night, and all day. She had brought her laptop and scheduled to meet with a court appointed attorney. Her savings were starting to run thin, she couldn’t stop looking for a job.

She had forgotten all about the thing hidden in the gap between the apartment walls. Almost forgotten.

She had gone back inside a few days after the shutdown, looking for her research laptop. She found it, but had also found ‘it’. It was all she had left of her work at the Life Foundation. Well, not ‘her’ work, but her workplace. Just a sealed glass cylinder with an attached pressure lock, and the swirling black and yellow ooze inside it. She had guessed it was some sort of lifeform and not some sort of Ferromagnetic liquid when it had started making shapes on the glass, like it was trying to communicate. Odd shapes too, shaped that could only be intelligently constructed, like a human handprint. She had tried to communicate for a time, but nothing much seemed to get through to it.

Soon it started fading, becoming less active. It had been dying, so she needed to save it. She began to experiment, putting things that it might be able to eat into the pressurisation chamber. Removing the oxygen so that its environment matched the one inside, and opening the door to the chamber. It rejected plant matter entirely. It nibbled slightly at meats before rejecting them too.

Quinn knew about the ooze too. He had been the one who suggested trying processed foods. ‘Something with lots of additives.’ He had said. Which is how they discovered that the ooze like chocolate. Ever since they had been sinking about a block of the stuff into the container every few days.

Tallah checked the clock on the wall, nearly time. She stopped her job hunt, closed the laptop, and went to help her son. She stopped before she opened the door. She knew he didn’t blame her for his injuries, but the guilt inside her was still there. She opened the door.

“Sweetie, it’s nearly time.” She said. Quinn was propped up in bed with a mountain of pillows, all of the ones that she could find around the apartment.

“Ok, mom.” He said and slowly twisted so that his legs were hanging off the bed, making small sounds of irritation as the pain spiked. Tallah moved over and sat beside him. He put an arm over her shoulders and she put one under his armpit to hold him up. Slowly they assumed a standing position, Tallah grabbed some pillows in her free hand, and they began to walk out to the lounge room.

She had just set Quinn down on the sofa when there came a knock at the door. She pulled a blanket up across her son’s lap, then moved to the door. She looked through the peephole and saw a woman standing outside, she had long, straight blonde hair, wore a simple black pant suit, and was carrying a briefcase. She opened the door.

“Hello, you’re our attorney, right?” Tallah asked.

“That’s correct,” she asked. Then introduced herself further. “The name is Anne Weying.”

“Good, come in.” Tallah said, and stood back. Anne entered and she closed the door.

“And you must be Quinn.” Anne said, looking towards her son on the sofa. She pressed her hand to her chest. “Anne Weying, your court appointed lawyer.”

“Hi.” He said.

“Would you like something to drink?” Tallah asked, then suggested. “Tea, coffee?”

“Just water would be great for now, thank you.”

“Sweetie?”

“I’m fine.”

“Ok then,” She said. “Please sit down, Anne, make yourself comfortable.” Then she walked into the kitchen to retrieve a pitcher of refrigerated water and some glasses.

“Thank you.” Anne said as she sat down in a chair around the coffee table and opened her briefcase. Tallah returned and placed one of the glasses in front of Anne, she filled it halfway with water before setting the pitcher in the middle of the table and spaced the remaining two glasses out in front of her and her son.

“To start off with, please recount your version of events.” Anne said. She began searching through her briefcase. “You’ve given a statement to the officers in hospital, but there are some separate questions to better prepare your defence.” She extracted a small device from the briefcase. “Can this conversation be recorded?”

“Umm.” Quinn said, not sure how to respond.

“You can record, until we say you can’t.” Tallah said.

“Very well.” Anne said, she didn’t seem like hadn’t expected something like this. She put it on the table and pressed a button. “Now, your account please, Quinn.”

“Well it was about half an hour since school got out, and I was on my way home.” He said. Anne nodded for him to continue. “I went into the supermarket and bought some chocolate and a can of soda, put them in my bag after I paid, then when I tried to leave these two security guys came and beat me up.”

“Can you remember the exact chocolate brands and sizes you bought?”

“Yeah, there was 4 blocks.” He lowered his gaze for a moment, trying to remember what the bars had been. “There were 3 blocks of milk chocolate, and one of dark. All Hersheys.”

“That aligns with what appears on the police report for unopened chocolate bars found in your bag.” She said. “You didn’t take your receipt with you, why?”

“I don’t know, I didn’t want it to just sit around in my bag.”

“Although the police were unable to read your receipt due to an accident with pasta sauce in that bin, we did some investigation of our own and bought the same thing you did from the store.” Anne said. Tallah blinked, slightly surprised at the effort and phrasing, she thought there was just one court appointed attorney on her son’s case. “We compared the sizes, and they were the same, so either there was a glitch in the system for one of the receipts, or we bought the same things.”

“Oh, cool.” Quinn said.

“Which means that the assault was without provocation, and not only are you innocent, but hopefully…” She paused for a second. “At the very least the court will make the guards have to pay for your medical care.”

“Cool.” Quinn said again.

“Oh, one last thing.” Anne said. “Why did you need so much chocolate?”

Tallah had wondered if this question was coming, but hoped it wouldn’t.

“I just like having it in the fridge, in case I need it after a long day.” She said. Anne looked at her, she hoped she bought it.

Anne sighed. It seemed she had.

“While that about covers the evidence of the case, there is still the jury.” Anne said. “As you may expect, the prosecution is going to try and tear down your image in the eyes of the jury.”

“Yeah.” Quinn said. “Figures.”

“So, we need to be ready to counter that with character witnesses.” She said. “How are you in school? Grades, punishments, behaviour, anything positive and negative, and above all please tell the truth.”

“I’m good in class, I guess.” He said.

“He gets good grades too.” Tallah said. “Nothing below a B minus last term.”

“That’s good. Are there any teachers that you get on well with?”

“There’s the science teacher, Ms Yew.”

“Great,” Anne said and wrote down the name. “Anyone else? Maybe supervisors outside of school, like clubs or such?”

“There’s the robotics club, but Ms Yew runs that as well.”

“Are there any teachers that particularly dislike you?” Anne asked. “The prosecution may try to get them to testify.”

“There was this English teacher last year, but he got fired.”

“Alright, that should be enough for now.” Anne said, starting to pack up her notes. She handed Tallah a notepad and pen. “Can we grab your phone number so that we can schedule another interview, Ms Wright?”

“Sure.” She took the offered stationary and did as requested. “Here you are.”

“Thanks, one last thing.” Anne said, standing. “Could we use your bathroom, please?”

 

“Could we use your bathroom, please?” She said, and felt an internal laugh as Toxin counted off the latest use of the plural. She thought to him “I’m trying to not be discovered.”

“ **Maybe but we remember what you thought of Eddie’s slip ups**.” Toxin said back to her, teasingly.

“Sure, it’s the third door on the left.” Ms Wright said. She directed her down the apartment hallway.

Anne placed her briefcase on the floor and went off to walk down the hall.

“Smell anything?” she said to Toxin.

“ **No**. **Do you think it might just be a coincidence?”** Toxin said. “ **Maybe she is just a former Life Foundation scientist who likes chocolate**.”

“It seems unlikely to me, and her response to needing so much chocolate seemed pre-prepared.” Anne replied.

Anne reached the third door on the left, she entered and shut the door behind her.

“Yeah, and 3 whole blocks of just plain milk chocolate would get a little boring.”

“ **Not to us**.”

“Exactly.”

Anne looked around the bathroom. There was nothing out of the ordinary, which they should have expected, Tallah probably wouldn’t have let her in here if she was hiding a symbiote.

“If we stay too long they’ll get suspicious.” Anne said. She turned the sink tap on and put her hands under it. She turned it off and then dried them. “We’ll tell Agony about our suspicions tonight.”

She exited the bathroom and made her way back to the lounge room.

“Thank you, Ms Wright.” Anne said, she picked up her briefcase and extended her hand for Tallah to shake it. She did so.

 

About nine hours later, Anne and Toxin were swinging their way towards the meeting location with Agony and Dora. She felt the wind blow through her hair, Toxin still wasn’t strong enough to fully manifest. It was different to swinging with Venom, where the black symbiote was wide arcs and some free running; the instincts that Toxin had were more direct, the blue tendrils they shot forth were mostly used as sort of a grapnel to accelerate them, using the momentum to transition between running and a sort of base-jumping off the rather short buildings. Eddie would never go for this sort of transport.

Toxin mentally poked her, and directed her attention over to their destination rooftop. They swung over and flipped before they landed. Dora smiled at the trick.

“I’ve got some stuff to talk to you about, but that can probably wait till later.”

“Alright.” She said. “we’re going to go find some prey, then you’re going to eat enough to get up to full strength.”

“Sounds good.”

“Just remember to be quiet,” She said, then her symbiote bloomed from behind, wrapping her body in that same purple second skin. “ **and follow us**.”

They swung for a few minutes over to the nightclub district. Finally settling on the roof of a larger club.

“ **Keep a look out for any potential targets**.” Agony said. “ **Large nightclubs can pay off fines easier, so they can ply drinks for longer, making it a literal and metaphorical watering hole**.”

“Targets for us, or targets for rapists?” Anne asked.

“ **A bit of both**.” She said. “ **Where there’s the latter the former will come eventually**.”

“Ok.” Anne said, and stared down at the street. There was a bachelorette party coming out of the club below them. A group should be safe, so Anne turned her attention to the other side of the street. She felt a tingling on her lower back, and a few moments later Toxin’s head was poking over the side to look around too.

“Eager for a live meal?” Anne asked.

“ **Yeah, chocolate’s nice but I want to eat meat**.”

They returned to viewing the street. Both their sets of eyes swiping back and forth between people walking around the street. Anne’s eyes locked onto a young man stumbling into an alleyway, he looked the way he came.

“Agony, we might have something.” Anne called. Agony came over and she pointed out the alleyway. “Young man, probably drunk in that alley. He seemed nervous.”

“ **And right on cue**.” Agony said as a woman confidently strode after him. They swiftly swung across the street onto the roof bordering the alleyway. The boy had made his way right to the end, the woman was still following, saying something. The boy may be trapped, but it wouldn’t be a dead end for him. Anne climbed over onto a fire escape, careful to not make too much noise.

“Come one, it’s just sex.” The woman said.

“I-“ The young man said, but the woman was moving towards him now.

“I promise you’ll enjoy it.” She said. Anne began to feel a little sick.

“No thanks, I gotta get home.” He managed to say, and tried to walk around her. She was too fast for him and caught his arm in her hand.

“No, you don’t.” She said.

“ **Yes, he does**.” Agony had dropped down into the alleyway. Both humans froze with fear. Agony turned to him and said “ **Run, boy**.” He ran past Agony, giving them a wide berth.

“What the hell’s up with you hey?” the woman asked. “I was about to get laid.”

Anger flared inside Anne, and apparently inside Agony too, as they thrust a powerful jab into the woman’s solar plexus. Anne descended the fire escape with the help of a line from Toxin.

“What sort of freak are you? Bitch.” She said.

“Because we’ve never heard that before.” Agony said and they slashed across the woman’s throat with their sharpened claws. Blood splattered across the bricks behind her. Anne landed on the alleyway floor. The sight of the fresh kill sends a bolt of hunger through her and Toxin. They grabbed a chunk of tissue and with a slight undertone of disgust from her, brought it to Anne’s mouth.

It felt odd, to say the least. Even without considering what it really was. It was something halfway between a Christmas ham and uncooked chicken breast. Not that she knew what raw chicken tasted like, but it was rather squishy. Her teeth chewed while her tongue pushed it around. The taste was obscured by the ferrous taste of blood. She wasn’t displeased that Toxin’s tastes seemed to be slightly overlaying with hers, and she could partly enjoy it.

Once she had forced a sizable portion down her throat she was dimly aware of Agony squatting down next to her and beginning to eat too.

Toxin began to grow up their arms. A slight chill here and there told her that they were extruded in other places. She shivered slightly as Toxin covered their breasts, and she ate with renewed gusto. Toxin finally spread to entirely cover their body, except the head.

“ **Can i-**?” Toxin asked in her mind.

“Yes!” she cut the symbiote off. She felt Toxin grin against her mind, and then the second skin extended up to cover her head.

They felt themselves flicker for a second as they began to exist in this new united state. A bolt of pleasure shot through them. They weren’t Anne Weying, they weren’t a symbiote, they were Toxin. They stopped eating, and reached their arms up stretching as high as they could. They ran their long tongue across their many sharp teeth. This was how they were supposed to be, it was right. Then they dived face first back into their first meal.


	7. They and He

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Toxin revels in their new existence, but a secret like that can't stay secret for long.

They might have gagged on the warm meat had they just been Anne, they wouldn’t have been able to eat it if they were just a symbiote. But Toxin loved it. They could feel Agony next to them, they were sharing their (Agony’s) kill. If their eyes could roll back in ecstasy any further they would.

But this feast was not infinite, and soon even the tiniest bone was gone. They stood up beside Agony.

“ **Congratulations**.” Agony said. They seemed to be breathing heavily. “ **Can you feel it**?”

“ **We can feel it**.” Toxin said, tongue lolling out of their mouth to lick the last of the delicious blood from their fingers. “ **We are Toxin**.”

“ **We should probably leave from the scene of the crime**.” Agony suggested. Toxin nodded and sent a line up to the roof in front of them, Agony followed and soon they were swinging through the city.

Agony landed on another empty rooftop and waved them over.

They landed there and were pleasantly surprised when they pulled them into a hug. They moved their arms around to return it, quite aware of how their breasts pressed together.

Far too quickly than Toxin would have preferred, Agony broke the hug.

“ **As we said before, congratulations**.” Agony’s smile slipped a little. “ **But we also need you to practice going back to your separate forms**.” Toxin’s smile did too.

“ **Do we have to**?” They whined.

“ **It’s just a precaution so you aren’t stuck like this five minutes before Anne has to go into work**.” Agony said. They knew that Anne needed to work, and that case… They suddenly remembered those things they needed to discuss and kept them on the forefront of their mind.

“ **Alright**.” They said.

“ **Good, now focus on the feelings or thoughts that are Anne’s or the symbiote’s and mentally pull yourselves towards them**.” Agony said. “ **For example, Dora cares for her kids, and Agony the symbiote likes Hershey Symphony Bars**.”

They tried to think of things that Anne might like, they came up blank for a few seconds, a timer sound effect mentally playing in their head. Then they realised, in all their enjoyment of the past few hours they had forgotten about Dan, Anne’s boyfriend.

They moved onto something that Toxin the Symbiote liked. That was rather more difficult, as Toxin hadn’t existed for long outside the canister.

Their mind jumped back a bit. Dan.

“ **Oh shit, Dan**!” They almost jumped. “ **What were we going to tell him? We’re going to slip up with ‘We’ eventually so he’ll know something’s up, and he already knows about symbiotes**.”

Panic started to overtake them, they had been so eager to join that Anne hadn’t even thought about Dan. She needed to figure something out, she started pacing.

“Ok, we’re going to have to tell him because it would be worse if he finds out.” She said.

“ **Anne** …” Agony said. But she ignored them.

“So, we should draw up a list of pros and cons.” She said.

“ **Anne**.” Toxin said in her mind.

“Not now, Toxin.” She said. “Pro, he’s talked with Eddie since the rocket and knows that he and Venom were fine with each other.”

“ **Anne**!” Toxin practically screamed at her.

“What?” She said, only to realise that they had managed to separate themselves. “Oh.”

“ **Good job**.” Agony said, and they separated too. Dora sat down on the rooftop and continued. “Even if it was an accident.”

“Thanks, I guess.” Anne smiled sheepishly, also sitting down.

“So how was your first time?” Dora asked.

“Phrasing please.” She said, and Dora smiled slightly.

“Funny, but seriously.”

“It was…” Anne struggled to find the words, it was strange, but good. It was completely different compared to her and Venom. It felt… she chewed her lip for a second, trying to come up with a contrast between them. “It was fantastic.”

“ **You were fantastic too**.” Toxin fluttered against her mind. She closed her eyes, enjoying how Toxin felt a little like a cool breeze when they did this. Toxin emerged from her shoulder and rubbed a cheek against hers.

“ **You two seem to be getting along well**.” Agony slithered out of Dora’s sleave. “ **It took us a whole week to get to that level of intimacy**.” Anne blushed slightly.

“So, Dan.” Dora said evenly. “Is he your boyfriend?”

“I- we- yes.” She said, feeling a little deflated. “He helped Eddie out when he and Venom had just bonded.”

“it doesn’t seem like you’re going to be able to hide Toxin for long.”

“Yeah, we should probably tell him.” She said. “And Eddie, although they’d probably both ask where Toxin came from, which would lead to you.”

“That’s fine, we’ve been planning on showing ourselves to Venom for a bit.” She said.

“How about we invite him out for coffee tomorrow morning, then you could meet us there?” Anne suggested. “As for Dan…” she paused and Dora took the chance to speak.

“Listen…” Dora said. “We, well, I have never been to good with romantic matters, let alone with men, but we think you should tell him sooner rather than later.”

“You’re right.” Anne admitted. “But you shouldn’t be so hard on yourself, you said something about a husband, right?”

“Ex-husband.” She corrected. “We got married out of college, and divorced six years later when we- I realised I was a lesbian. Turns out I did too much science, not enough experiments.”

“Oh, we’re sorry.”

“It’s ok,” Dora said, “I don’t know what would have happened if I had realised the truth then; But I don’t think I’d trade it in. I love my daughters, they mean the world to me.” A small smile formed on Dora’s face.

“We think you’re right about Dan, I should tell him, tonight.” She said, then remembered. “Except he’s probably sleeping off a twenty-four hour shift stiff, so in the morning, definitely.”

“He’s in medical?”

“A paediatrician at San Francisco General, yeah.” Anne said.

“His surname isn’t Lewis, is it?” Dora asked curiously.

“Yeah, do you know him?”

“He was the attending Doctor when my eldest had tonsillitis.”

“Huh,” Anne said. “Small world.”

“Small world indeed.” Dora said. “So, was there anything else you wanted to talk about?”

“Oh, yes.” Anne said. “There were other symbiotes recovered in the crash besides Venom and Agony, right?”

“There was Riot, who escaped.” She said. “And Scream, who nearly died of oxygen exposure after their host died suddenly, so we stopped testing with them for a bit.”

“Did you find Scream’s canister in the Labs?” Anne asked.

“No, we assumed it had been smashed.”

“Perhaps not,” Anne said, then looked around. “My current client in the public defender’s office was buying a lot of chocolate before be was accused of theft, and his mother just said she likes to have it in the house. It was four blocks, and he had a bunch of wrappers in his schoolbag.”

“You think one of them is bonded with Scream?”

“I’m not sure.” Anne said. “It isn’t the son, he’s taking a while to heal after some racist security guards beat him up. The mother might, she did use ‘I’s but that’s not conclusive.”

“So, either the mother is bonded with scream, or scream is still in the canister somewhere they can easily get to them, to feed them.”

“And get this, the mother used to work at the Life Foundation.” Anne said. “She was in the files I went to pick up last night, when we met.”

“Hmm.”

“ **We should confront her, without Toxin and I showing ourselves.** ” Agony said. “ **Make up an excuse to enter the apartment while Anne is there, then ask outright**.”

“There are a few ways that could go wrong though, we debated with each other inside the apartment. She could just like chocolate.”

“ **How about we keep the two busy in the lounge while Agony sneaks in and looks around the rooms**?” Toxin said.

“That’s a better idea, we think.” Dora said. “When’s your next meeting with them?”

“Probably the day after tomorrow, we haven’t determined that yet.”

“Well, until then we have a bit to be getting on with.”

“Alright, tomorrow morning is Dan, tomorrow noon is Eddie.” Anne said. “Wait, how am I going to contact you?”

“Oh, right.” Dora said. “I bought a burner phone this morning, can I grab your number?”

“Sure.”

After they had exchanged numbers, and with a final congratulations, they departed the roof in opposite directions.

 

When they got in Dan was still sleeping. Anne tiptoed around, changing into her pyjamas, and slipped her way into bed. She quickly fell asleep, feeling rather content after her earlier meal.

Before she knew it, she was swinging across the city again. She was Toxin, but different, odd. She brushed it off for now, she had a mission to do.

The wind felt perfect against her body, Toxin’s second skin letting her feel every outside sensation. It whipped and pushed and buffeted against her as she climbed up to a roof.

Did she know this building? She broke open one of the ventilation shafts and crawled in. The sheet metal barely made a sound as she kept her points of contact to places where it was drilled into supports. Light drifted up through the grilles that allowed air to pass into the vents. She didn’t stop to look, she knew where she was going.

She found the vent she was looking for, she looked down into the room. It was an office she was familiar with, and its owner sat at a desk, back to the grate. She silently tore it off. She knew the crunch of metal snapping would not alert the man before her.

She dropped down into the office. The man at the desk heard this. He turned.

“It’s so good to see you today, dear.” Dan said as he stood up.

“ **I hope you don’t mind me dropping in**.” She said, her voice overlaid with Toxin’s voice, like it was when they were one.

“Not at all.” He said, smiling. He leaned in to kiss her wide maw. They embraced and shared a kiss. He pulled back.

“Not today.” Eddie said in place of Dan. Before she could react with shock, their lips met. He pulled back, changed again.

“ **Never again**.” Venom said in place of Eddie. Without pulling her into another kiss, the symbiote clad figure transformed again.

“ **You never wanted me**.” Toxin, as when she and they were one, said. “ **You only wanted Venom**.”

“No!” Anne shouted, now realising she was no longer covered with Toxin. The not exact truth came easy, less a response to the statement and more a rejection of the situation, she knew what would come next. The figure changed again.

“ **When we figure that out, we’re gone**.” Agony said, taking the place of Toxin. Half the mask pulled back from Doctor Skirth’s face. “All of us.”

“No!” Anne said as Agony seemed to melt. They fell down quickly, like Doctor Skirth’s body had vanished from inside them. Like an ice statue that had suddenly unfrozen. The purple puddle sat there on the floor for a few seconds before draining away through the solid concrete.

“No. This- No.”

“Anne.”

“No!”

“Anne!”

“Don’t leave me, please!”

“An- What the hell is that?”

She woke.

 

“Anne!” Dan shouted from beside her. Her whole body jumped. “What the hell is that?”

“Dan, what?” She said blearily. She sat up and stared at him, he had left her in bed and was standing against the wall. She realised that Toxin had partly extruded across her, Toxin retracted back into her. “Oh.”

“Venom’s back?” He said in trepidation.

“We- no.” She said, then remembered. “Well, yes; but Venom isn’t here.”

“Then what is that supposed to be?” He asked.

“ **I’m sorry, you were scared and I couldn’t hold back from trying to help**.” Toxin said in her mind.

“No it’s alright, i-“ She thought to Toxin. Then she focused back on Dan and thought. “We need to handle this quickly.”

“This is another symbiote.” She said, planning out where she would go from here. “This is Toxin.”

“Okay, but why is it here?”

“They-“ she said pointedly. “are here because they can’t survive without a host.”

“But how did this happen?” he said, and dropped his voice. “Nevermind, we know how to fix this, just come with me to-“

“No.” she said firmly. “I volunteered.”

“Are you safe?” He said tentatively, relaxing back from the wall when she nodded.  “Why? What about your nightmares? Venom did that to you.”

“Not exactly…” She said, looking away from him. “I- I wasn’t… the nightmares weren’t about that. They were… I missed it.” Dan was silent. Anne hated the silence, but she couldn’t break it.

“How… did this happen?”

“I got called back in by Todd Michelinie, he wanted me to go get some files from the Life Foundation ruin.” She said. “One of the doctors, the doctor who helped Eddie sneak in… Carlton Drake tried to execute her by symbiote.”

“So, you’re its latest host?” Dan interrupted.

“No. They were a good match, according to the doctor, and have been living in the facility since.” She continued before he could interrupt again. “But Drake’s symbiote, Riot, had spawned. The doctor found them and saved them in an airtight container.”

“Spawned?” He asked, then continued without prompting. “I guess that makes sense, if you’re far away which is likely to happen in this… situation… then asexual fission makes more sense.”

“Yeah, we guess. But their race isn’t big on child rearing, so Toxin was a pretty blank slate until we bonded.” She said.

“I- were you going to tell me?”

“Yes, in-“ she looked at the clock beside the bed. “about half an hour when we woke as normal.”

“And Eddie?”

“We, meaning us and the doctor, were going to talk to him today.” She said.

“Us?”

“Me, Anne, and the symbiote, Toxin.”

“Jesus, Anne.” He said. “Don’t you remember what happened to Eddie? It was killing him.”

“And they haven’t yet, Venom survived the fire.” She said.

“What, really? How?”

“Survived the fire or not killed him?” She requested clarification, then added the answer she knew. “I’m not sure about Eddie, but the doctor has been surviving on a combination of chocolate and… horrible people.”

“Horri-“ He said before he realised what that meant, and what that meant for Anne. “How many people have you eaten?”

“Just one.” She said. “Or two if you count when I was bonded with Venom.”

“Anne, how could y-?”

“How could I prevent a kid from getting raped?”

“Anne, you know that’s not what I meant.” He breathed out conspicuously.

“I- I’m sorry.” She said, that had been too far. “I know.”

He said nothing, and sat down on the edge of the bed. She moved herself over next to him.

“Do you want to meet them?”

“No.”

“I’m sorry.” She wasn’t, not really.

“I just need some time to get used to this.” He said.

“Take all the time you need.” She said, dreading what might come next.

“I need some time alone.”


	8. Departure, Domesticity, and Deli Meats

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Anne recovers from her nightmare, Eddie is asked to meet for lunch by Anne, but he discovers two things he wasn't expecting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eddie POV this chapter.

Dan left before she did. She wasn’t sure exactly where he went, probably to a hotel. She couldn’t blame him, she would probably done the same thing in his position; it still hurt. She had hoped that he would be enthusiastic at the chance to talk to another alien. Given her nightmare this was probably the best outcome.

“ **Anne, your dream**.” Toxin whispered against her mind.

Her stomach clenched. She had jumped at the chance to host another symbiote after Venom. The idea of her and Venom together had preoccupied her for so long… she couldn’t convince herself that, on some subconscious level, Toxin was just a replacement for someone she couldn’t have.

“I’m sorry.” She said quietly. She swallowed. “You deserve better than me for a host.”

“ **I want to stay with you**.” Toxin said.

“You don’t have to.”

“ **I want to**.”

“Thank you” Anne sighed.

“ **I know you won’t forget about Venom** ,” Toxin said. “ **but I can try to help you**.”

“Do you have some sort of symbiote memory alteration?”

“ **No, we can be together and do stuff together**.”

“I-“ Anne choked a little on a sob. “Thank you, Toxin.”

“ **You’re welcome**.” Toxin said. “ **You forget you are my first host**.” She felt Toxin almost grin cheekily inside her mind. “ **And you never forget your first**.”

“Damn it.”

“ **Speaking of firsts, shouldn’t you call Eddie soon**?”

Anne called Eddie. He sounded fine, and would meet her at one for coffee, maybe lunch.

She left early, after calling Dora to tell her the location, and went off to buy more chocolate bars before she met up with Eddie.

 

_A few hours earlier._

Venom got in late, or rather, early that morning. Things had just managed to regain some stability, they could finally synchronise again. After that robber at Mrs Chen’s they decided that the best thing to do would be to go home. They opened the window to their apartment and crawled through.

They tried to psych themselves up for this next bit, it was always bad.

Eddie and Venom wrenched themselves apart, the black costume mostly retreating, except for two arm-like tendrils wrapped around his chest.

“ **That guy was stringy**.” Venom said.

“I know, babe, I was there.” Eddie said. He set the plastic shopping bag on the kitchen counter and began unpacking.

“ **Tater tots. Chocolate chips**. **Chocolate milk.”** Venom listed off as they emerged from the bag. “ **What the hell is are those orange things**?!”

“Sweet potato fries.” Eddie tried to say calmly. He couldn’t help grin. “They’re like normal fries, but sweeter.”

“ **This is a betrayal**.” Venom said, melodramatically, but still in a way that said there was some hurt there.

“How about I make a chocolate sauce to go with them?”

“ **I would like that**.” Venom said, placated. “ **But first, tater tots**.”

“No, first is sleep.” Eddie said as he placed the frozen foods in his freezer, and the milk in the fridge.

Venom grumbled slightly at this.

“Ven, it’s two in the morning.”

“ **Doesn’t stop us being hungry**.”

“We’re always hungry.” Eddie said, he flopped down onto their unmade bed. “It will all be there in the morning.”

 

Eddie awoke to the sound of a ringtone. It was still the default, a simple upbeat song. He groaned, and felt Venom extrude a tendril from his shoulder.

“Why haven’t I changed that thing already?” he asked the universe. He rolled over and opened a hand, which Venom dropped the phone into. “Thanks, babe.”

The tendril morphed from a grabbing appendage to one with a face on the end and nuzzled up against his cheek.

“Hi, Eddie here.”

“Hey Eddie, it’s Anne.” He heard the voice on the other end say.

“Oh, hi.” He said. “How’ve you been?” he kicked the loose sheet off and moved to stand up. Venom grumbled a bit at not being able to snuggle longer, and drew back into his skin.

“It’s complicated.” She said.

“So…” he trailed off, he wanted to ask why she was calling, but didn’t want to seem rude.

“I was hoping you might want to get coffee today.”

“Oh, sure, great.” He said, and turned around to find his phone to look at the time. He then realised he was using said phone.

“How about lunch as well? At that little deli on 12th?” She asked, then added. “I’ll be buying.”

“Sounds great, is Maria still working there?” Eddie asked, the kindly old Italian was generous with the cured meats on her incredible sandwiches. He grabbed a pair of jeans, slung over the back of a chair. He held the phone against his shoulder.

“Yep, is 12ish good?”

“Awesome, I will… see… you there.” He said, dragging the jeans on.

“See you then.” Anne said, and hung up. Eddie dropped the phone onto his bed and finished putting on the jeans.

“ **You’ve been seeing a lot of her lately**.” Venom said.

“Yeah, well, we’re friends.” He said. “Friends hang out with each other.”

“ **Alright**.”

“And friends me and Anne will remain.” He said, soothing the unsaid jealously in his partner. He decided to change the subject regardless. “So, what’s breakfast this morning? Nutella on toast or chocolate puffs?”

“ **Nutella**.” The symbiote growled. It was a friendly growl, not an angry growl.

“Alrighty.” He walked over to the kitchen, slammed some slices of bread in the toaster, and retrieved the gooey brown spread from the cupboard.

“ **I still don’t understand the requirement of this charred starch blend as a tool for Nutella consumption**.”

“Ooh hoo, big words today.” Eddie teased. “I told you, it’s for texture.”

“ **I have looked into your memories, and you used to eat it without it**.”

“Yeah, when I was a kid. Things change.” He said. “besides, I don’t want to be eating stuff that smooth by itself before I hit retirement age.”

“ **That assumes you have a job to retire from**.”

“Babe, you piece of shit.” He said as the toast popped up. He grabbed the slices and put them on a plate, he glanced over at the clock on the microwave, it read 00:00 and was flashing. “Damn, I need to set that.”

He unscrewed the jar of Nutella, took a knife, and began to spread it on toast. He finished one slice and was about to go back to the jar for more when…

“Damn it, Venom!” he quietly shouted, the symbiote was poking their head into the jar, eating quietly.

“ **We’re hungry**!” they said, pulling their head out of the jar. “ **You can’t blame us for trying**.”

“Yes, I can.” He said and stuffed the plain toast into the symbiote’s mouth. He quickly closed the jar of Nutella and put it away. “I get the Nutella toast because you couldn’t contain yourself.” He took a bite of the toast.

“ **You are the most reprehensible human being I’ve ever bonded with**.” Venom said, choking down the warm, dry bread.

“Maybe.” Eddie shrugged off the playful insult and went over to lie back on the bed.

He chewed as he grabbed his phone, enjoying the chocolatey spread. The time was about ten in the morning, so he had a few ours to do some writing before going to meet up with Anne.

For all the horrors that Cletus Kasady had committed, none was more gut wrenching than the one that got him caught. He had always left clues, he wanted to be caught and ‘admired’ in his own way, for his murders. But the fact that he left a cell phone inside the mouth of one of his victims was too far. The second he called it to gloat about his latest victim the swat team had been alerted and was enroute to his location as the tracking was narrowed down.

Also, his hair was really weird, it looked like a bad wig. Eddie hadn’t read up many of the details of the murders, but he knew that there was something ritualistic about the layout of the bodies. He shook himself, there was no use just thinking about the case and not writing, so he got to work.

 

He arrived at the deli at five past twelve, Anne was already there. She was waiting outside for him. he smiled.

“Hiya. How’re you doing?” he asked.

“Like I said on the phone, it’s complicated.” She chuckled. “We should get something before we start talking.” They went inside.

Maria was indeed still working there; her sons hadn’t managed to convince her to stay at home yet.

“Are my favourite couple back together, hmmm?” she asked cheekily in an almost too nosy way.

“No Maria, we’re just here to have lunch as friends.” Anne said, smiling at her.

“Oh… that’s a pity…” she said, overacting her disappointment. “So, what are you having today?” They ordered their sandwiches and moved over to a booth past a couple of people sitting at tables.

“So, what did you want to talk about?” he asked, and took a bite of his sandwich.

“Me and Dan are on a bit of a break.”

“Oh no, that’s not good.” He said, and genuinely meant it. He hadn’t been in a good way when he had first bonded with Venom, but Dan had been really nice given how strange he had been acting. “Can I ask what happened?”

“He… left this morning.” She said. “I can’t really tell you why, just not until someone else gets here.”

“Someone else?” Eddie was confused. His mind flashed around for possibilities. “Did you cheat on him? did he cheat on you then you both found out and you got angry at him for hiding it from you both?”

“Whoa, hold up, cowboy.” Anne said, and held her hands up. She looked up. “Ah, here she is.” Eddie had hardly any time to ponder this when before he recognised the voice.

“That Maria is so nice, and really generous with the corned beef.” The voice said. Eddie watched as Dr Skirth sat down next to Anne. He didn’t realise his mouth was open until she said. “You’re going to catch flies.”

He felt Venom grumble inside him. He didn’t like her.

“Doctor Skirth?” he said, mystified. “How- how did- I thought Drake killed you.”

“And yet, here I am.” She said, and picked up half of her Rueben.

“I- I guess he failed then.” He said. “just-“

“Well, the better way to phrase that would be ‘Here we are.’” She said.

“Wait, you-“  he said, the ‘we’ could only mean that she had bonded with a symbiote, but how could she have done that if Drake had tried to- oh. “He tried to kill you by exposing you to a symbiote.” This could be bad.

“Yeah, sorry we didn’t make contact sooner.” She said. “But you’re a hard man to find.”

“ **Her story is true, she is bonded with one of my brethren**.” Said Venom in his mind. “ **I can’t tell which one though, there is a strange smell**.”

“Look, you’re making it very obvious with that big pause.” Anne said. “So I’m just going to come out and say it, we know Venom is alive.”

“ **Whoops**.”

“Then you’ll know what I did to Riot if you plan on bringing any more symbiotes here.” He said.

“Relax, Agony and I aren’t going to try some foolish plan like Riot did.” Skirth said.

“ **Agony. So that’s who**. **Yes, I smell them**.” Venom whispered to him. “ **You can trust Agony, they were never in favour of that plan**.”

“Venom says I can trust you.” Eddie said.

“ **Agony, not Skirth**.”

“Although they still have a bit of resentment to you Doctor.”

“That’s… understandable.” She said. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry for what I did.”

Anne twitched. Eddie felt something bump his leg from under the table, and saw a purple symbiote face looking up at him.

“ **That’s Agony. Mostly**.” Venom said, and extruded from his knee to talk one on one with the changed symbiote. “ **You are purple. Why**?”

“ **Laboratory induced colour change, but I don’t mind it**.” They said.

Eddie looked up to Doctor Skirth.

“I’m sorry I didn’t go back for you that night.” He said.

“Think nothing of it, if you had I never would have bonded with Agony, and-“ She glanced at Anne. Eddie’s brain ticked over.

“Wait, this is who you cheated on Dan with?” he whispered. Anne looked confused at first. Doctor Skirth’s face twitched.

“No, and I didn’t cheat on him, exactly.” She said.

“What do you mean, exactly?” he asked.

“We have reason to believe that other symbiotes escaped the Life Foundation Labs after the incident.” Anne said. “We just think its Venom, Agony, and two others.”

“Wait, did Riot survive somehow?” He asked.

“ **Eddie** …”

“No, thank goodness. But we know where one is, and have a good hunch on where the other is.” She said.

“ **Eddie**.”

“So, where’s the one you know?”

“ **Eddie, you idiot**.”

“What, Venom?” he said, ducking below the table to see three symbiote faces on tendrils coming from their host’s legs. Including a red one from Anne’s. He resurfaced from the table and let out an “Ah” of comprehension.

“Yeah.” Anne said, looking around awkwardly.

“So…” He said, trying to take everything in. “What happened?”

“Went to look into the Life foundation for Michelinie, met Dora in the ruin, Toxin here had been left in a container and she and Agony had been taking care of them but it would be easier with a host.” She rattled off. “Dan found out, which is why he’s staying in a hotel for now.”

“He broke up with you?” ‘Dora’ asked.

“No, he just said he just needed a bit of a break.” Anne said. Eddie couldn’t help but see that Dr Skirth’s face fell slightly.

“ **And when you shifted back to Mr Brock from Anne with a kiss, that was so cool**.” Eddie heard ‘Toxin’ say from beneath the table. He couldn’t help but be amused at being called ‘Mr Brock’.

“So, now that the six of us are on the same page with that, what about this fourth symbiote?” He asked.

“We think that one of my recent clients knows where it is.” Anne said. “Confidentiality is going out the window, but I think it’s warranted.”

“ **We think the symbiote in their possession is Scream.”** Dr Skirth’s purple symbiote, Agony, said from under the table. “ **The last of the ones that survived re-entry**.”

“How do you know this?” Eddie asked.

“Can you think of another reason why a kid would buy four chocolate bars on his way home from school and have a bunch of empty wrappers in his bag?” Skirth said. “Apart from the obvious.”

“What obvious?”

“That he really likes chocolate.”

“Oh, gotta say I was expecting something more…” he said, trailing off while trying to find the right adjective.

“More what?”

“I don’t know, more something.”

“Well, regardless, we need to have a look around the apartment without them interfering.” Anne said. “I was going to distract them in the lounge room at our next meeting while Dora looked around, and if you can be there too you should be able to get more ground covered.”

“What do you think, babe?” Eddie sent silently to Venom. Partly to keep the message itself a secret, partly to keep their relationship a secret, they didn’t need to know just yet.

“ **As much as our abilities on this planet make us far stronger than others, I must admit that it has been good to talk to another symbiote again**.” Venom thought back. “ **And Scream would be safe to introduce to a potential host on this planet**.”

“Alright, we’re in.” He said.

“Thanks.” Anne said as her phone rang. She looked at the number calling and grimaced. “It’s Michelinie, probably wants to know where his files are.”

She got up, Toxin retracting back into her leg, and walked over to a corner where she answered the call.

There was an awkward silence between Doctor Skirth and him. it lasted for a few seconds, which soon extended into a minute. Doctor Skirth glanced over at Anne.

“So…” Eddie said, trying to break the silence. He didn’t continue.

“Yeah…” Doctor Skirth said. She didn’t continue.

The whole thing was very uncomfortable.

Doctor Skirth glanced back over at Anne. Venom poked their head above the table and lightly headbutted Eddie’s arm. He reached over and gave them a little scratch. Doctor Skirth turned back looking rather downtrodden, and saw him petting Venom.

“Oh my god.” Eddie said, just realising something. He leaned into Doctor Skirth. “You like her, don’t you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Skirth you useless lesbian.


End file.
